Re: FWD: Russia mulls rocket power 'first' - pinpoint thruster landings on Earth
Pat Flannery
OM wrote:
> ....From the BBC, the network that still knows how to do TV right:
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8024590.stm
Yeah, and we've seen this idea before, except last time around it broke
the eardrums of everyone who landed in it:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/zarya.htm.
.....and sci.space.tech is the only one of my newsgroups you aren't
killfilled in, so let's play it careful, like the way porcupines screw. :-)
Pat
Ken S. Tucker
> OM wrote:
> > ....From the BBC, the network that still knows how to do TV right:
>
> >http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8024590.stm
>
> Yeah, and we've seen this idea before, except last time around it broke
> the eardrums of everyone who landed in it:http://www.astronautix.com/craft/zarya.htm.
Pat, I thought steering using parachutes was pretty much
a proven technology, for example I've seen the pro's jump
out (parachute) from a few thousand feet and pull cords to
guide themselves to a 50' X on the ground.
I also thought NASA had a cancelled X-plane that used
that for the ISS (?).
...
Ken
Damon Hill
4ax.com:
> ....From the BBC, the network that still knows how to do TV right:
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8024590.stm
That's going to be exciting, especially for the first live
crew that has to depend on it. The first few test landings
should be entertaining as well.
Any of-course landings will be exciting for those on the ground
who happen to be in the way, too.
Wonder what the propellants will be?
--Damon
Pat Flannery
Ken S. Tucker wrote:
> Pat, I thought steering using parachutes was pretty much
> a proven technology, for example I've seen the pro's jump
> out (parachute) from a few thousand feet and pull cords to
> guide themselves to a 50' X on the ground.
> I also thought NASA had a cancelled X-plane that used
> that for the ISS (?).
>
That was the X-38 ISS lifeboat prototype:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_X-38
Which used a steerable rectangular parawing for landing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:X-38_Ship_-2_Landing_on_Lakebed_EC99-45080-101-EDIT1.jpg
Pat
Pat Flannery
Damon Hill wrote:
> Any of-course landings will be exciting for those on the ground
> who happen to be in the way, too.
>
> Wonder what the propellants will be?
>
The article mentions alcohol, so probably either alcohol/LOX or
alcohol/hydrogen peroxide...or possibly nitrous oxide?
Zarya, the spacecraft that was the inspiration for this, was going to
use Lox/kerosene: http://www.astronautix.com/craft/zarya.htm
Pat
Damon Hill
news:2uSdnThaXNHsNmPU...@posted.northdakotatelephone:
Those do seem the most likely choices other than hypergolics. We'll
see how it all works out in practice. Given Shuttle and Buran, it
won't be the first landing system without a backup method.
--Damon
Pat Flannery
Pat Flannery wrote:
>
> The article mentions alcohol, so probably either alcohol/LOX or
> alcohol/hydrogen peroxide...or possibly nitrous oxide?
> Zarya, the spacecraft that was the inspiration for this, was going to
> use Lox/kerosene: http://www.astronautix.com/craft/zarya.htm
I've been putting more thought into this, and if they are indeed going
to use alcohol, then it might well be a alcohol/hydrogen peroxide
system. They have experience with hydrogen peroxide inside of a capsule,
as the Soyuz descent module uses simple hydrogen peroxide decomposition
to generate the steam for its RCS.
I'd have to do some more checking, but hydrogen peroxide and alcohol
might well be hypergolic, as the propellants for the Me-163B rocket
fighter in WW II were hydrogen peroxide and a fuel that was primarily
alcohol: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-Stoff
If not pure alcohol, then alcohol with something added to cause the
hydrogen peroxide to decompose into oxygen rich superheated steam.
I'm somewhat surprised they aren't using LOX/synthol, as they figured
out a way to use that in the RCS of the Buran shuttle*, though maybe
they are concerned about the long-term storage problems of LOX in a
orbiting spacecraft that may make flights of several months duration if
it is transferring crew to a space station, like the present Soyuz does.
* Not easy, as you then need a separate ignition system in the rocket
engine. Here's a cutaway of one of the Buran RCS thrusters:
http://www.buran.ru/images/gif/odu4gif.gif
... and a photo of an actual one: http://www.buran.ru/images/jpg/odu4.jpg
Both are from this webpage: http://www.buran.ru/htm/odu.htm
Which also has embedded videos of the RCS and OMS engines being test-fired.
A sort-of translated version of it is here:
http://babelfish.yahoo.com/translate_url?doit=done&tt=url&intl=1&fr=bf-home&trurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.buran.ru%2Fhtm%2Fodu.htm&lp=ru_en&btnTrUrl=Translate
Pat
Pat Flannery
Damon Hill wrote:
> Those do seem the most likely choices other than hypergolics. We'll
> see how it all works out in practice. Given Shuttle and Buran, it
> won't be the first landing system without a backup method.
>
The article states that they are thinking of installing a parachute
back-up in case the landing engines fail...which sort of defeats the
landing engine concept if you ask me, but they say the landing engines
are for precision rather than to save weight over a parachute system -
which could leave the capsule floating sideways due to winds as it descends.
As Ken Tucker pointed out earlier in this thread, a steerable parachute
system would get around this problem also, and would seem a lot easier
to do than the landing rockets.
Pat
Damon Hill
news:3g6vv4pt7813a8ghm...@4ax.com:
> On Mon, 4 May 2009 20:42:34 EDT, Pat Flannery <fla...@daktel.com>
> wrote:
>
>>I've been putting more thought into this, and if they are indeed going
>>to use alcohol, then it might well be a alcohol/hydrogen peroxide
>>system.
>
> ....What type of alcohol, and in what concentrations? I've cleaned
> wounds using isopropyl followed by peroxide, and haven't blown up. At
> least not yet.
>
> Yes, yes, I know. Keep trying...:-P
There are alcohols and then there are things that are marginally
alcohols with varying degrees of ignitibility and energy. And I'll bet
you weren't using 99% peroxide. But I'm guessing the motors will use
a catalyst bed to decompose the peroxide and then inject the fuel,
while should readily burn with the hot oxygen. Semi-redundant in that
the superheated steam should have a fair bit of thrust by itself.
All in all, sounds kinda sporty...
--Damon
Pat Flannery
OM wrote:
>
>
>> I've been putting more thought into this, and if they are indeed going
>> to use alcohol, then it might well be a alcohol/hydrogen peroxide
>> system.
>>
>
> ....What type of alcohol, and in what concentrations? I've cleaned
> wounds using isopropyl followed by peroxide, and haven't blown up. At
> least not yet.
>
The Me-163B Komet used methanol...wood alcohol.
V-2 used ethanol, so that Germany's big brewing industry could be used
to distill it from potatoes, like vodka.
Normal drug store H2O2 is only 3%, with the other 97% being distilled water.
I think the highest "proof" hydrogen peroxide I've ever run into for
sale is 5%.
You clean a wound with "T-Stoff" HTP and you aren't going to have to
worry about it getting infected...or that part of your body existing
anymore if you keep it in there for more than 30 seconds.*
I'm actually kind of keen to get a miniature bottle of "Everclear" ethyl
alcohol and a bottle of drug store hydrogen peroxide, and mix the two
together to see if you get bubbles and a elevated temperature.
(If not...well...I've still got one hell of a mouthwash ready then,
don't I? Any bacteria it can't outright dissolve is sure going to be
reduced to a drunken stupor... and the big bouncer "Tommy Tooth" is
going is going to pick their pockets, and hurl them right out of my
mouth in a dead exhaled form as I snore.)
BTW, I ran into a propellant combo I had never heard of before while
digging around in my books to find out the isp of H2O2/alcohol
....hydrazine/LOX.
This apparently has a better isp then kerosene/LOX, which makes my
wonder why no one has ever used it on a space booster.
The upgraded versions of the Soyuz booster did use, and Buran was going
to use, "Sintin" in place of kerosene.
This was a artificial hydrocarbon fuel to replace kerosene that gave
cleaner burning and superior isp:
http://www.astronautix.com/props/loxintin.htm
In fact, the embedded video of the Buran OMS engine firing shows this to
be an extremely clean-burning fuel with virtually no carbon-particle
smoke: http://www.buran.ru/htm/odu.htm
Unfortunately, the disintegration of the Soviet Union left the factory
that made Sintin in another country than Russia, so Soyuz had to go back
to kerosene.
* A thing you don't really want to read about, as it involves a Me-163
pilot getting killed by hydrogen peroxide during a take-off accident.
If you do want to read the gruesome details, then scroll down to see
part of a old posting of mine....but I wouldn't suggest doing this just
before dinner, as you are going to be thinking about it for a _long_
time after you read it.
..
Here's what happened to Joschi Pohs when his Me-163A crashed on takeoff,
drenching him in hydrogen peroxide as his rocket plane lay inverted - as
recounted in Wolfgang Spate's book "Top Secret Bird":
" 'After we recovered the wreckage,' Brede continued with his precise,
technical presentation, 'we put the pilot's body in a casket. Even
though he was wearing a protective suit, his entire right arm had been
dissolved by T-Agent. It simply wasn't there. There was nothing more
left in the sleeve. The other arm, as well as the head, was nothing more
than a mass of soft jelly.' "
At that point, Spate yelled at the doctor, telling him to just shut the
hell up. One hopes the impact knocked Pohs unconscious or killed him
outright. The H2O2 did that to him in around one minute's time.
I'll bet around 99.9 % readers of this posting scrolled right on down,
didn't they? :-D
Pat
Ken S. Tucker
> OM wrote:
>
> >> I've been putting more thought into this, and if they are indeed going
> >> to use alcohol, then it might well be a alcohol/hydrogen peroxide
> >> system.
>
> > ....What type of alcohol, and in what concentrations? I've cleaned
> > wounds using isopropyl followed by peroxide, and haven't blown up. At
> > least not yet.
>
> The Me-163B Komet used methanol...wood alcohol.
> V-2 used ethanol, so that Germany's big brewing industry could be used
> to distill it from potatoes, like vodka.
> Normal drug store H2O2 is only 3%, with the other 97% being distilled water.
> I think the highest "proof" hydrogen peroxide I've ever run into for
> sale is 5%.
> You clean a wound with "T-Stoff" HTP and you aren't going to have to
> worry about it getting infected...or that part of your body existing
> anymore if you keep it in there for more than 30 seconds.*
> I'm actually kind of keen to get a miniature bottle of "Everclear" ethyl
> alcohol and a bottle of drug store hydrogen peroxide, and mix the two
> together to see if you get bubbles and a elevated temperature.
In my experience, 30% H2O2 is readily available.
That concentration can be increased by gently
heating to evaporate off the H20. I had to snug up
some stoppers and got a bit on my skin, strange
thing is the burning sensation increased when I
rinsed my hands.
Everclear can be distilled to boost the alcohol
content of course.
I do recommend "eyedropper" quantities until
you're confident of it's characteristics.
Ken
Pat Flannery
Ken S. Tucker wrote:
> In my experience, 30% H2O2 is readily available.
> That concentration can be increased by gently
> heating to evaporate off the H20. I had to snug up
> some stoppers and got a bit on my skin, strange
> thing is the burning sensation increased when I
> rinsed my hands.
> Everclear can be distilled to boost the alcohol
> content of course.
> I do recommend "eyedropper" quantities until
> you're confident of it's characteristics.
>
Having been blown up once in my life already, if this gets done at all, it gets done with just the stuff off of the shelf in its dilute form. :-D
Now the Russians are saying that the landing rockets will be solid fueled: http://www.russianspaceweb.com/ppts_landing.html
Pat
Ken S. Tucker
> Ken S. Tucker wrote:
> > In my experience, 30% H2O2 is readily available.
> > That concentration can be increased by gently
> > heating to evaporate off the H20. I had to snug up
> > some stoppers and got a bit on my skin, strange
> > thing is the burning sensation increased when I
> > rinsed my hands.
> > Everclear can be distilled to boost the alcohol
> > content of course.
> > I do recommend "eyedropper" quantities until
> > you're confident of it's characteristics.
>
> Having been blown up once in my life already, if this gets done at all, it gets done with just the stuff off of the shelf in its dilute form. :-D
I hear ya ;-). I suggest you do it outside, from
a reasonably safe distance.
> Now the Russians are saying that the landing rockets will be solid fueled: http://www.russianspaceweb.com/ppts_landing.html
If we knew the speed at the quoted 800 m we could
calculate the necessary deacceleration to get to 0v
at 30 m, also the capsule weight then get the weight
of the solids, given an Isp.
BTW, I think this re-entry technology has potential,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotary_Rocket
Ken
Pat Flannery
Ken S. Tucker wrote:
>
> BTW, I think this re-entry technology has potential,
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotary_Rocket
>
So did the Soviets at one time.
See the Soyuz model with the rotor blades... see the dents in the Soyuz
model with the rotor blades:
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/s/soyrotor.jpg ;-)
That's from here: http://www.astronautix.com/craft/soyz7kok.htm
Pat
> Ken
>
>
BradGuth
> ....From the BBC, the network that still knows how to do TV right:
>
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8024590.stm
>
>
> --
>
> ][
> ] OMBlog -http://www.io.com/~o_m/omworld [
> ] Let's face it: Sometimes you *need*
[
> ] an obnoxious opinion in your day!
[
> ][
It'll still conventional reenter and parachute it's way down to the
last few hundred meters, or perhaps at most a km. That's hardly a fly-
by-rocket return and downrange controlled landing.
~ BG